Breaking News! French aircraft missing off Brazil

An Air France passenger jet with 228 people on board has gone missing over the Atlantic Ocean on its way to Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris.

The aircraft dropped off radar screens after it took off from Rio de Janeiro on the Brazilian coast on Monday, airport authorities said.

Air traffic control lost contact with the flight at 06:00 GMT on Monday, shortly after it took off.

A spokeswoman for the Paris airports authority confirmed that the aircraft had not arrived at its destination, where it was due to land at 11:10am (09:10 GMT).

An aviation official in Paris said they were "very worried".

"The plane disappeared from the screens several hours ago. It could be a transponder problem, but this kind of fault is very rare and the plane did not land when expected."

Air France said it had no further information on the whereabouts of Air France flight AF 447, which it said had 216 passengers and 12 crew on board.

Gabriel Elizondo, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Sao Paulo, said the Brazilian air force had mounted a search.

"The Brazilian air force ... has apparently said they are searching near an island called Fernando de Noronha, which is a Brazilian island about 340km off the northeast of the Brazilian coast," he said.

"But it's important to note that this plane has only gone missing at this point."

Authorities have set up a crisis centre at Charles de Gaulle airport, with Dominique de Bussereau, the French junior transport minister, due to arrive.

Search teams have recovered eight more bodies from the Air France jet that crashed into the Atlantic more than a week ago, bringing the tally so far to 24.

Colonel Henry Munhoz, a spokesman for Brazil's air force, said eight more bodies were found on Monday about 650km northeast of the Fernando de Noronha islands off Brazil's northern coast.

Sixteen bodies were recovered in the same area over the weekend and were expected to arrive on Tuesday at Fernando de Noronha, where forensic teams have been set up to identify the bodies using dental records and DNA samples from relatives.